Microsoft, Israel and Vanunu By Eileen Fleming

Al-Jazeerah, February 24, 2006

On February 22, 2006, in Israel, more than a few government officials maybe wishing they had allowed Mordechai Vanunu to quietly leave Israel in April 2004 when he was released from 18 years in jail for telling the world the truth that Israel had gone nuclear. Instead Israel chose to keep him under severe restrictions and constant surveillance.

On February 22, 2006 in a Jerusalem court it was revealed that Israel had asked Microsoft to hand over all the details of Vanunu's Hotmail account before a court order had been obtained.

According to Vanunu, "Microsoft obeyed the orders and gave them all the details…three months before [I was] arrested and my computers [were confiscated]…it is strange to ask Microsoft to give this information [before obtaining] the court order to listen to my private conversations. It means they wanted to go through my emails in secret, or maybe [with] the help of the secret services, the Shaback, Mossad."

Attorney Michael Sfard repeatedly requested Police Representative Mr. Peterburg, to specifically state what type of espionage activity Vanunu was accused of. According to Vanunu, "The policeman did not have any answers and said that he brought all the evidence to the court. When Sfard asked him again about any material related to the 'espionage' [charge] Peterburg had no answers.

"Sfard proved that the police had misled the judges who gave the orders to arrest me: to search my room, to go through my email, to confiscate my computers and [that they] misled Microsoft to believe they are helping in a case of espionage."

"The State came to the court with two special secret Government orders; Hisaion [documents or information that are deemed confidential by the government and kept from the court, the defendant, and lawyers.]

"This allows the prosecution to keep documents related to [my] court hearing secret. One was from the Minister for Interior Security and one from the Minister of Defense."

Vanunu's secretly taped police interrogations, his 2004 Christmas Eve arrest for "attempting to leave the country" while traveling the four miles from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, the confiscation of his private property by thirty IDF that stormed into his room at St. George's Cathedral have all "been done…under the false and misleading statements to the courts of 'suspicion of espionage', and yet they are not charging me with spy crimes… [And] the fact is that I have not committed any crimes."

Vanunu's trial resumes on May 1, 2005 and so does the exposure of a Mid East democracy that makes accusations of espionage without providing the evidence.

Eileen Fleming, activist, author, poet, reporter for the WAWA Blog: http://www.wearewideawake.org

Earth, a planet hungry for peace

Apartheid Wall


The Israeli Land-Grab Apartheid Wall built inside the Palestinian territories, here separating Abu Dis from occupied East Jerusalem. (IPC, 7/4/04).

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, like a Python. (Alquds,10/25/03).

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